Child Pornography Newsgroups: A Deviant Subculture

The Internet has considerably modified the means and volume of the distribution of child pornography. Usenet newsgroups are an important component of this problematic where cyber pedophiles can exchange illegal materiel and discuss their methods amongst each other. Three of these newsgroups have been infiltrated to study the nature of the interactions among those participants. More than 1,600 communications have been analyzed to portray the elaboration of a subculture of deviance (in Becker’s terms). Therefore, in this article we present how this subculture helps those deviants to legitimize their illicit behaviors, and also how they create new rules in order to neutralize the effects social stigmatization regarding their deviance. By deviance we mean here a complex social process where social actors tend to occupy a specific place in the symbolic construction of their deviance (child pornography).